


don't wanna be lonely, just wanna be yours

by theroyalsavage



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan, The Heroes of Olympus - Rick Riordan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Nico is a singer, Real light bc I'm a softhearted gremlin, This is vanilla af idek, Will is Tired, light angst tho
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-15
Updated: 2016-08-15
Packaged: 2018-08-09 00:15:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7779157
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theroyalsavage/pseuds/theroyalsavage
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Will Solace, café manager extraordinaire, just wants to coast through their monthly open mic night in peace. He definitely is not banking on meeting a handsome stranger with the voice of the gods and the death glare of a high-ranking member of the KGB. And yet, that's exactly what he gets.</p>
            </blockquote>





	don't wanna be lonely, just wanna be yours

The first time they meet, it is decidedly unremarkable.

The sun is beginning to set outside, staining the light inside the café an improbable shade of pinkish gold. Will’s feet are beginning to ache from standing on them all day. There’s flour on his fingers. The smell of coffee in his nose. A stain on his apron from spilled vanilla.

Nothing particularly particular at all.

The bell above the door chimes quietly when the boy walks in. Will glances up and smiles, but the boy isn’t looking at him. His head is down, gray-green beanie pulled down over his forehead, hands pressed into the pockets of his leather jacket.

Will hangs out behind the counter for a second, waiting for the guy to ask a question or place an order. When he doesn’t move - just stands there, head down, hands in pockets - Will grabs the bucket of cleaning supplies and gets to work on the nearby tables.

The streetlights are going on outside. One by one, in succession.

It’s almost closing time.

Will finishes wiping down the tables before moving back behind the counter. The boy is shifting from foot to foot, glaring at one of the notices tacked to the café bulletin board like it’s personally offended him.

His nose is a little scrunched up at the bridge. Will leans on the counter and props his head up on his hand.

“Can I help you find something?” he offers. The customer freezes immediately and his eyes snap up to meet Will’s. There’s a look on his face, something close to alarm, like he’d expected to be ignored completely.

“No,” the customer says. “I don’t need help.”

He’s cute, Will thinks. A couple dark curls escaping from his beanie. Wide, expressive eyes. Smooth, brown skin. His shirt is white, with black letters in the middle spelling out ‘NO.’

Will follows the line of his gaze to the sign that’s up on the wall, advertising for an open mic night the café is holding. “Ah. I see. Are you signing up to sing?” he asks, and the boy reels back.

The look he shoots Will is half panicked and half lethal. “I,” he begins, and then he stops.

Will drums his fingers on the counter. “Hm,” he says. “I guess you want to, then. What’s holding you back?” He holds out a pen, as an offering, and when the boy just stares at his hand like it might be venomous, he drops the pen on the counter. “I’d go for it. It’s a low-pressure environment, here, and you’re not getting paid anyway. No one will mind if you suck.”

The boy’s cheeks have flushed darker. Will thinks there might be a dusting of freckles on his nose.

“What?” Will lifts his head off his hand, batting his eyes, giving the customer his most innocent smile. “Are you nervous about singing in public, or something?”

“Something like that,” the boy says, flatly. (He has an interesting accent, Will thinks. Not like he’s struggling with pronunciation. More like the words don’t fit quite right on his tongue.) And then, his pretty mouth twisting into a scowl, he snatches the pen off the countertop and scrawls his name onto the sign-up sheet.

 _Nico di Angelo_.

“Nico di Angelo, huh?” Will asks. “What is that? Italian?”

Nico slams the pen back on the counter, mutters, “Goodnight,” and stalks away.

Will watches him go, watches the door close, watches him retreat down the sidewalk and hug his leather jacket closer around himself. The sunset has passed, now, leaving the sky - and the café - bluish and faded.

 _(What a jerk_ , Will thinks.

 _He_ was _really cute, though_ , Will thinks.

 _I’d like to hear him sing_ , Will thinks.

And then he does not think about it at all.)

* * *

Open mic night means a couple things for Will, as executive manager of Apolline Café.

The first: it means putting in a lot of overtime. The week or so leading up to the event is even more hectic and absurd than usual. Will still has to oversee all the usual things - baking, customer service, upkeep of the shop, so on and so forth. Only, now he also has to figure out equipment rentals, publicity, and the shop’s Aesthetic-with-a-capital-A.

The café is always completely altered the evening of open mic night. They push the tables and chairs away from the far wall, creating a space for the stage. There’s no way to set up spotlights or a platform, so instead, they drape the entire wall with strings of Christmas lights, which make the whole room seem sparkling. It’s a nice result, but it takes _forever_.

The second: it means asking (read as: begging) his _employees_  to put in a lot of overtime. It’s not hard to convince Austin, who’s paying his way through an incredibly expensive performing arts academy. Kayla is a little trickier.

The third: it means revenue. Which is nice.

The fourth: it means more heavy lifting than he has to do at literally any other time of the month. Ever. At all.

The speakers are the hardest to lift, but the wiring can be really tricky to finagle, too. Will is positioning the mic stand in the center of their makeshift stage when the bell above the door jingles and a rush of cool air spills into the shop. He turns, smile bright, only to meet Nico di Angelo’s eyes.

Nico goes still, adjusting his grip on the guitar case in his hands. He’s in a steely gray sweater, today, with a white collared shirt buttoned all the way up to his throat underneath. His hair is covered by a beanie again, this time in a deep maroon.

“Oh,” he says. “It’s you.”

“It’s good to see you again, too, valued customer,” Will chirps, placing a hand on his hip. “Are you always this friendly?”

“Are you always this loud?” Nico shoots back. Then he sighs and says, “Where should I sit?”

“Anywhere.” Will spreads his arms out wide. “Pick a table, any table. We won’t be starting for another half an hour or so.”

Nico nods and makes a beeline for the table most distant from the counter. He glances at Will once before dropping onto a chair and pulling his phone out of his pocket.

Will rubs a hand on the back of his neck and whispers, “Okay, I’m going to try not to be offended by that.”

More and more people begin to trickle in as the event’s advertised time gets closer. Before long, the café is packed, and Austin is bringing folding chairs out from the back to accommodate the new arrivals.

Will helps the first act set up on stage and studiously keeps himself from looking over at Nico di Angelo.

Things go smoothly for the first half of the show. Will hands out coffees and hot chocolates, mini cupcakes and lemon squares. The shop fills with music, making the air warm and heavy. Viscous, like sugar water.

And then there is a lull, a pause, and now Nico di Angelo is taking the stage. The strings of lights make him look different, somehow. Something beautiful but dark. A shadow. A ghost.

He sits on the stool in the center of the stage, cradles his guitar to his chest. And then he opens his mouth, and Will is lost.

His voice is the sound of quiet. It is low and true, silken and rich. It is coffee, and wintertime, and the feeling of fingertips across bare skin. It is the kind of sound that catches in your chest and turns to static in your throat. He is singing in Italian, Will thinks, but the words feel familiar.

By the time he’s finished, there isn’t a dry eye in the house. Nico’s gaze meets Will’s as he’s stepping off stage. Will chokes out, “Wow,” and then the café is thundering with applause.

(That night, after the show, Will emerges from the back room to find Nico standing in front of the stage and staring at it with an expression that makes Will’s chest ache.

“You were amazing tonight,” Will says, and Nico jumps.

“It was nothing special,” Nico says, scuffing at the ground with the toe of his boot.

“It was a miracle,” Will says, and then Nico looks stunned, and Will’s ears are burning, so he just blurts, “Goodnight,” and runs.

Right before the door to the back room slams shut behind him, Will hears Nico say, quietly, “Goodnight.”)

* * *

A month passes before he sees Nico again. Not that Will’s counting, of course. Between school and work, he doesn’t have time to daydream about a boy he’s only met twice.

Honest. Swear to God. Cross his heart and hope to die.

(Okay, maybe he daydreams about him a little.)

And then the weeks have passed, and open mic night rolls around again.

Outside, the streetlights flicker on as Will lifts speakers into position on stage. There’s already a hum of people crowding into the café. He hears more than one person referencing the boy with the voice of an angel who sang last time.

“I hear he studied music from the masters in Italy.”

“Really? I wonder how long he’s lived in the States.”

“I wonder how old he is?”

“ _I_  wonder if he’s single.”

Will drops a speaker on his toe.

Stars immediately burst in front of his eyes, the crash and his yelp bringing the conversation behind him - mercifully - to a halt.

“You okay?” Austin calls from behind the counter.

“Great,” Will croaks, even though his toe is quite possibly broken. And then he mumbles, “Ow,” and stoops to press his fingers against the aching spot.

No, probably not broken. Really, really bruised, though. As in, discoloration for weeks, bruised.

“Fuck,” Will mutters, just once, with feeling.

“Here,” a voice says, above him, and then the person is bending and lifting the fallen speaker up and away from Will’s foot. The stranger quickly and deftly pushes it into place on the stage, then steps back and away.

“Thank you so much,” Will manages, straightening up after one last press to his toe. He shakes his foot out once before turning to look at the person who’d helped him.

“Oh,” he says.

Nico di Angelo says, “You should be more careful, idiot.”

Will tries to smile, but it probably looks more like a grimace. “Well, gee. I didn’t know you cared about my well-being.”

Nico frowns. “I don’t. Those speakers are expensive.”

Hurt blooms in Will’s chest, for some ridiculous reason he can’t really name, but then he realizes that Nico’s cheeks have flushed a little, and he’s studiously avoiding meeting Will’s eyes.

Something else flowers next to the hurt.

Will thinks it might be hope.

He desperately wants to squish it down.

“Well, either way, thanks for your help,” Will says, his voice a little too high, a little too shaky. “Are you singing tonight?”

Nico moves his weight from foot to foot and tugs on the sleeve of his sweatshirt. “Yeah. I am.”

“Well, I’m sure the crowd will be thrilled. I’ve overheard three different women wanting your number in the past ten minutes alone.”

Nico’s eyes snap up to meet Will’s. They’re brown, Will realizes. Warm. Flecked with these little lines of gold, like flaws on the surface of a diamond. He really does have freckles across his nose, too, barely visible against the olive of his skin. Will sort of wants to touch them.

“What about you?” Nico asks.

“Do I want your number?” Will echoes, dumbly.

Nico turns crimson. “No - no, do you… I mean. That is.” He scowls. “Never mind.”

“Oh,” Will says. “You mean am I glad you’ll be singing tonight.”

Nico’s gaze returns to the floor. Will takes that as a yes.

“I am,” Will says. And then he leans forward, close to Nico’s ear. “And I wouldn’t say no to your number, either.”

(That night, when Nico performs, it is somehow, impossibly, even more incredible and breathless than last time. At the end of the night, he is gone before Will can find him, so he doesn’t leave the café with his number.

But, he thinks, he _does_ leave with something infinitely more precious.)

* * *

“You’re going to drop that on your foot again.”

Will starts but manages to keep his hold on the speaker in his arms. He can’t see whoever’s approached him over the equipment he’s clutching, but he knows the voice, even before he manages to set the speaker down.

“Nico,” he says.

Nico lifts a hand. “Hi.”

“You know, you could offer to help,” Will points out, a little bitterly.

Nico takes a sip from what looks like an iced coffee and shrugs. “I could,” he says. “But then you’d be putting your paying customer to work. That doesn’t seem right to me.”

Will sniffs. “You’ve never bought anything here before.”

“I didn’t want to seem like a freeloader,” Nico says. And then the corner of his mouth quirks up, just slightly, into a smile. “Good coffee.”

“Is it? Our hot chocolate’s better.” Will dusts his pants off and straightens up. He’s taller than Nico, he realizes, by almost half a foot. It’s funny, he doesn’t seem small on stage.

He seems larger than life. Titanic.

Nico takes another sip of coffee. “Doubtful. This is really good.”

“Sure, but _I_ make the hot chocolate.”

Nico rolls his eyes, but the almost-smile is still in place, and Will’s chest feels warm.

“Break a leg tonight,” Will says, and Nico salutes him with the coffee.

(And if, after the show, Will approaches Nico’s table with a hot chocolate in each hand - if he says it’s on the house - if Nico accepts it without a word, but gives this tiny, throaty groan when he takes the first sip - if Will wipes whipped cream off Nico’s nose with his thumb, well, then…

Nobody needs to know.)

* * *

“Favorite color,” Nico says, breaking the cookie in his hands in half.

“Too easy. Blue. Next.”

“Major.”

“Medicine. Boring.”

Nico huffs. “Fine. Um… favorite animal.”

“Golden retriever. Come _on_ , Nico, make me _think_  a little.”

“Okay, all right, all right, pushy. What’s your greatest dream?”

Will beams at him and reaches forward to swipe half of the cookie out of his hands.

“To save lives.”

Nico’s lips curve upwards. “How humanitarian.”

“I like to think so.”

“Hey, Will,” Kayla shouts from the door, “Austin and I are heading out. Are you good to close up?”

“Is all the sound equipment packed away?” Will calls back.

Kayla almost _audibly_  rolls her eyes. “Of course.”

“Then goodnight, and I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Sure, see you tomorrow.”

Nico absently takes a bite of his cookie and checks his phone, wincing when he sees the time. “It really is late,” he says. “And you’ve been working all day to set up the stage and stuff. I don’t want to keep you-”

“It’s fine,” Will says, probably too quickly. “It’s… really fine.”

Nico looks at him sharply, the kind of look that makes Will feel transparent and thin.

“Okay, I’m a little tired,” he admits. When Nico gets to his feet immediately, he waves his hands in protest. “Not that tired! And you’re a customer, and you’re not finished eating yet, so-”

Nico shoves the rest of the cookie into his mouth in one bite.

Will folds his arms over his chest. “Okay, now you’re just being mean.”

Nico snorts and tries to chew the mouthful of cookie, covering his face with his hands while he eats. When he’s finally done, he takes a deep breath before saying, “Solace.”

 _My name_.

_My name._

_He said my name_.

“Do you still want my number?”

“I,” Will manages. And then he chokes a little, coughs, continues: “Yes. That is. Something that I want.”

Nico snorts and shakes his head before grabbing a napkin and scribbling a series of numbers onto it. He pushes it into Will’s hand and then stands, stooping to pick up his guitar case.

“Nico,” Will says.

Nico’s gaze comes down to meet his. Whatever he was about to say dies on the tip of his tongue. In the heat of Nico’s gaze, but also partially in the realization:

Will is in love with him.

In love with him and his stupid voice and his molten eyes and the way he turns everything to gold.

“Thanks,” Will finishes, lamely.

(Above the number, on the napkin, a single word in Italian is written. It takes Will three days to get up the courage to look it up on Google Translate.

The word means _dearest_.

Will cannot breathe.)

* * *

Will thinks about Nico a lot.

He thinks about his hands, his fingers, knobby and warm brown on the frets of his guitar. He thinks about his music, the way it turns the air to fire, the way it sets Will’s bones alight. He thinks about his smile, and the runaway curls tucked below his beanie, and the way his voice might wrap around Will’s name.

He thinks about Nico _a lot_.

They are friends, maybe. Will isn’t sure. They text, and Nico stops by the café, and sometimes Will treats him to dinner, but Will doesn’t think friends look at each other the way Will knows he looks at Nico.

And, sometimes, the way Nico looks back.

 _Carissimo_.

Dearest.

So, not friends, then. Something else.

It is Nico’s fourth month straight attending open mic night, and Will is helping him set up before they begin. Nico is by far the café’s most popular performer ever - he’s long since taken over the number one spot in the lineup.

“They love you, Guitar Hero,” Will remembers telling him, and he remembers Nico’s laugh.

They’re putting the finishing touches on the stage, Will stepping away from the platform and Nico taking his seat, when the café door swings open. An extremely tall, gaunt man steps through, alone, older than the café’s usual patrons. He’s in an immaculate black suit, his dark hair slicked back against his head.

Will calls out in greeting. The man gives him a short nod of recognition.

And when his eyes meet Nico’s, both of them freeze.

Will sees the color drain from Nico’s face, sees the altered way his hands grasp at his guitar. White-knuckled and frightened. Holding it like a shield.

Nico’s head snaps towards Will and Will jerks his chin towards the man. _Okay_? he mouths, and Nico takes a deep breath.

“Hello,” he says into the microphone, and the crowd inside the café goes wild. But Will doesn’t recognize the quiet control in his voice, the restrained way he’s holding himself.

It makes Will’s blood turn to ice.

After the performances are over, Will can see the man making his way through the crowd, winding slowly towards Nico’s table. He can see the way Nico is folding in on himself, going still and silent. And he knows - he _knows_  - that this is not his place. That he’s overstepping his boundaries. That this is between Nico and this stranger.

That he has no right to Nico’s life.

And yet.

(And yet.)

Will rushes to Nico’s side before the man can get there, sending brief, gratified smiles at the customers milling around. When Will reaches the table, Nico looks up, startled, and Will places a hand on his shoulder.

“He’s coming this way,” Will says, in a low voice.

Nico’s mouth twists.

“Do you want to talk to him?”

“No,” Nico says, his voice low and fierce.

“Follow me,” Will says, and Nico does.

Will leads him to the back room and then up to the roof. Nico’s shoulders are shaking by now, crumpling like paper, and, when Will opens the door to the roof, they are met with a blast of icy air.

Nico wraps his arms around himself, tucks his chin into his sweater.

“It feels like snow,” Will whispers.

Nico starts crying.

They stand like that for a long time, Nico buried in his sweater, Will trying to rub the cold from his bare arms. Will is trying, desperately, to put things together inside his mind. The dark man’s expression, his features, the way Nico looked when he walked in.

Will thinks, once or twice, about pulling Nico into his arms, but he doesn’t think Nico would appreciate that, much.

Eventually, Nico’s breathing evens, his tears slowing and then, finally, coming to a stop. He takes a slow, shuddering breath before angrily scrubbing the final tears off his cheeks with the heel of his hand.

“Sorry,” he mutters. “Fuck. I’m sorry.”

Will shakes his head. “It’s okay. You don’t need to talk about it if you don’t want to.”

Nico sniffs. “My dad’s a piece of shit, and I’m pathetic.”

“You’re not pathetic,” Will says, gently.

“I’m terrified of him.”

“That doesn’t make you pathetic.”

“It makes me a coward.”

They stand there, staring at each other, Nico’s hands balled into fists at his sides. Will tries, desperately, to assemble a thought, to decide what to do - how to fix this.

“We’re all cowards,” he finally says. “It’s just a matter of how well we hide it.”

“Oh, yeah?” Nico lifts an eyebrow, sniffing loudly again. “What about you? What are _you_ afraid of, perfect Will Solace?”

Will says, “You.”

And then it is quiet.

Nico’s eyes are wide. Startling, even in the low light.

“I’m in love with you,” Will says.

Nico says, “No.”

Will shakes his head. “I _am_. I am. I’m sorry, Nico. I’m in love with you.”

Nico’s expression has gone very shattered, his shoulders very tense. “I - you can’t be - I don’t-”

And, oh.

 _Oh_.

It is beginning to dawn on Will that perhaps he has read this situation very, very wrong from the start.

“I’m sorry.” Will repeats, a note of panic in his voice now.

“I have to go,” Nico says.

“Nico, _please_ -”

Will watches him leave.

(The first snowflake of the season lands on his cheek and melts. Cool, like a teardrop.

Will does not cry.

He presses his knuckles against the brick wall until they bleed.)

* * *

A week passes.

Two.

Snow piles up along the sidewalks, drifts like dandelion fluff across the streets. New York is cold, cold, cold.

The worst part, Will thinks, is that he remembers what it felt like to be warm.

Life without Nico di Angelo is decidedly unremarkable. Everything is exactly, precisely as it was before he’d met him. Nothing special. Nothing new.

The realization is lead in Will’s stomach. A simple, and probably obvious truth: life goes on. Always, always. Life goes on.

(The walk home from work is silver. The sky is iron-gray.)

* * *

It isn’t until the third week of silence from Nico that Will finally tells Austin and Kayla what happened.

Austin whistles and sets his tray of bread dough down, beating flour off his hands. “Shit, dude,” he says. “That sucks. That really sucks.”

“He’s obviously an asshole,” Kayla tells Will flatly, shoving a tray of fresh-baked bread into his hands so he can transfer it to the display case. “You were all buddy-buddy for months, and now _nothing_? Don’t you think that’s kind of fucked up?”

“Kayla,” Austin begins, gently.

Kayla waves an oven mitt at him. “Don’t you _Kayla_  me. What, you think Will should stay hung up on this dickwad? Seriously?”

Austin winces. “He did blow you off, man. That was a shitty thing to do.”

Will buries his face in his hands. “I mean, I did kind of confess my undying love to him. And, you know, make a complete and utter ass of myself. I sort of can’t blame him for running away.”

“You can and you should,” Kayla snaps. “He should’ve at least had the common decency to call or something.”

“Kayla-” Will starts.

“She’s right.”

All three of them freeze, turning slowly on the spot to see Nico di Angelo approaching the counter, hands in his pockets, eyes on Will.

“Will,” he says.

“Nico,” Will says.

“Okay,” Austin says. “We’re going to finish icing the cupcakes. Kayla?”

Kayla makes a soft sound in protest but lets Austin drag her away, muttering something about, “Stupid idiot boys.”

And then the back door swings shut behind them, and the shop is quiet, and Nico and Will are alone.

Will fights the urge to drop Nico’s gaze, or crack a joke, or busy himself with the register. Nico’s hair is dusted with snow, hair flyaway across his forehead, beanie twisted up in his hands.

Finally, Will manages, “Are you hear to tell me to fuck off? Because I’d really… I’d rather just not experience that, to be honest.”

“No,” Nico says. “I’m not.” And then he is stepping forward, something fierce and determined passing over his face, his hands closing in Will’s collar from across the counter.

“I’m sorry,” he says, and then they are kissing, Nico’s mouth open and cold against Will’s, and he tastes minty and sharp, that tang that only comes from standing outside in winter. It’s not comfortable - the edge of the countertop is digging into Will’s stomach, Nico’s kiss is a little too searing to be considered pleasant - but there’s still fireworks inside Will’s stomach. Music inside his mind.

Nico’s hands drop Will’s collar and move to cup his face, freezing fingers curling in Will’s hair, trailing along Will’s cheekbones. Will presses a palm against the back of Nico’s neck and burns with the way Nico shudders into the touch.

Breathless, breathless.

Nico pulls away first, breathing hard and heavy. He drops back down onto his feet, lifting a hand to cover his face.

“I’m sorry,” he mutters. “I’m really sorry. I fucked up.”

“No-” Will blurts, loud and desperate, but Nico’s shaking his head.

“Not the kiss. The kiss was.” He pauses, flushes. “Good. I mean… I shouldn’t have run away from you. It was unfair and cruel and a fucked up thing to do and I shouldn’t have done it.”

“You don’t owe me anything,” Will says, with some difficulty.

Nico sighs, pushes his hands through his already-mussed hair. “I know, Will. I’m trying to say that I love you too.”

Will is made from static, white noise. His whole body. “Then, why-”

“I’ve spent a lot of time trying to not be what I am,” Nico says. “And, seeing my dad sort of brought it all back. It was easier just to run. That’s what I’ve always done.

Will hesitates, then says, “You love me.”

Nico’s nose scrunches up a little. “I love you.”

Will beams at him, and then, when Nico sticks his tongue out and lowers his face in embarrassment, Will vaults the counter and curls his fingers into Nico’s hair. “You love me,” he repeats. “I love you too.”

Their second kiss is better than the first. Will coaxes Nico’s mouth open with his, and Nico’s fingers touch the nape of Will’s neck, and there’s no counter digging into Will’s belly, which is a definite bonus.

Will leans back and presses a lightning-quick kiss to Nico’s cheek. Nico rolls his eyes.

“Get a _room_ ,” Kayla shouts.

“Kayla, you’re getting frosting on your shirt,” Austin yells back.

(They leave the café that night hand-in-hand, Will humming tunelessly, Nico smiling softly, and everything in the universe is turned to gold.)

**Author's Note:**

> me: appears after approximately ten years with more mushy nonsense


End file.
